Honey, Dont fly like a maniac!!!

Its the year 2030 and the roads of Delhi are bursting at their seams. I fly to my home in a Ankyo PAV(Personal Air Vehicle) that costs little more than 42000$. I got my first intro to PAV's courtesy the Jetsons on cartoon network. As I googled more into it I realized that the idea had actually been brought very close to reality. In fact one of the colleges I applied to, Illinois Tech, has an active research cell on this topic.

I reason that there are three prime requirements of PAV's.
1.Ease of Use
2.Low cost and maintenance
3.Strong safety record

Safety is a core concern. That however can be taken care of provided the design and working of the vehicle is sound. Besides being really ease to use that is.

The second point also depends largely on the design and working. Right now the option of a VTOL(Vertical take off and Landing) engine is popular. VTOL's take very little area to get into the air. They are also extremely slow at landing/takeoff stage giving users superior control. The only problem is that the cost of these engines are exorbitant. Still with innovations in material sciences and propulsion systems such as carbon fiber and tilt rotor, anything seems possible.

                                                    a harrier lifts of vertically with a column of air

The thing that interests me the most is the ease of use part. This will be the soul of the plane, its software. Planes are managed by electronic systems called avionics which run on a software. These softwares of the future have to take various inputs and effectively fly the plane single handed. This is because the average driver would know very little about complex flying. It will be akin to putting an AI (Artificial Intelligence) into the plane. Unlike the US air drones which still depend on user input, these airplanes will be the ultimate robots in the air.